Vanguard 1000 tournament

With no ranged weapons, you'll have virtually no chance at destroying tanks and skimmers. I've played lists like this before, and for a thousand points using only vanguard creatures... I'd really suggest dropping as many upgrades as you can to simply field more troops. An extra genestealer here or there may not seem like much, but the more you have... the more you can afford to lose on the way in.

As with any entirely-CC army... having plenty of cover is also going to be essential for your success. You'll definitely have a hard time unless the board's surface area is at least 25% viable cover. Try to avoid obvious kill-zones and avenues of attack.

Expect to have difficulty with any vehicle you can't easily drop a Lictor behind or pin in a corner with a couple of groups of genestealers. You may also consider not infiltrating your Brood Lord, and instead advancing slowly. With all those genestealers to try to get shots at, your opponent may forget about him long enough for him to actually reach close combat (which won't happen if he's infiltrated).

danjones87 said:

so would you agree to drop all gene upgrades except scuttlers on all the troops?

Click to expand...

In a relatively small points game (1,000), I'd even drop scuttlers for the sake of extra genestealers. If you're playing on a cityfight board (yay! Another urban 'nid army! ) you should have plenty of cover to hide behind in deployment. With enough genestealers, Extended Carapace becomes a moot point (they won't get gunned down quickly enough). I do find that Extended Carapace is actually a poor investment for a tournament army on Genestealers (your mileage may vary), but there are typically enough bolters that the 4+ save still doesn't cut it. It may be worth the points if you have a lot of IG opponents, however.

My experience with genestealers (and all little tyranids, for that matter), is that strength in numbers really outweighs the value of any upgrade. Since genestealers are your basic troop, taking a lot of basic genestealers isn't a poor choice.

danjones87 said:

i might infiltrate him but not move it out of saftey for a couple of turns, so the opponant has lots of options to shoot.

Click to expand...

That's also an effective choice, and can be quite disruptive. I actually moved my Brood Lord into a position where he could easily threaten the enemy command unit. My friend didn't move that unit for three turns, because he was terrified I'd get the charge if he did. It was pretty funny, actually.

The risk, however, comes from positioning. A fast enemy vehicle squadron (such as necron destroyers) could decimate your Brood Lord in a few turns of firing, so use infiltration intelligently.

The more numbers you have, the better your ability to "pin" enemy tanks in a corner and rend them apart after you've eaten all his troops. The big problem with an all-genestealer list, is any army that fields a large number of Skimmers. Eldar, Dark Eldar, Tau, and even Space Marines can blow your stealers apart from relative safety if they know you're coming.

I'd feel bad for an Eldar list with three Wraith Lords, however.